Ernesto Bazan

Gynecologist listening to fetal heartbeat, Remedios

1996

About

Italian photographer Ernesto Bazan, born 1959, uses his black-and-white photographs to document one of the most complex times in Cuban history. From the vivid street life he captured in the first years after his arrival in Cuba in 1992, to the contemplative panoramic images of ISLA published for the first time in 2014, Bazan lets the absence of color speak, symbolizing the despair and hope enshrined within the Cuban community. Yet, grounded in warmth, and borne from the artist’s deeply treasured connection with the people of Cuba, the series conveys the heady, erratic energy through the lens of an insider.
Ernesto Bazan is represented in the collections of such prestigious museums as the Museum of Modern Art and the International Center of Photography in New York City; the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, TX. Bazan is the recipient of the W. Eugene Smith Grant; Mother Jones International Fund for Documentary Photography; Dorothea Lange-Paul Taylor Prize at Duke University, NC; and the World Press Photo award; as well as fellowships from the Alicia Patterson Foundation and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation. In 2009, his book “Bazan Cuba” was awarded Book of the Year at the New York Photo Festival.